Columbo is anything but a failure, though, and the audience knows that. His genius is leveraging humility to convince killers that he's a bumbling idiot, while in reality he's onto them from the first encounter.
_Slow Horses_ came up in another thread. I'd argue that Columbo has more in common with Jackson Lamb than with Charlie Brown.
_Slow Horses_ came up in another thread. I'd argue that Columbo has more in common with Jackson Lamb than with Charlie Brown.